Author: lizdodds89

After my last hospital visit to Calgary, I had a rather lovely few weeks of holiday! A few days in Banff, in the Canadian Rockies before flying to San Francisco to meet a friend. From there we drove up Route 1 to Arcata then via Chico, Sacramento, Gilroy (for the garlic festival!) to Monterey before flying to New York and then to home.

My final stop was in Calgary, at the Alberta Children’s Hospital. The hospital was built ten years ago but you would think it was newer to walk around it as it looks enviably good, particularly as viewed by someone like myself coming from a 1970’s build!

BC Children’s Hospital is in a very nice suburb of Vancouver and is due for a total overhaul as a new hospital is being built just nearby to replace the current one which should be ready in 2017. The PICU should see a big change when they move as they will be going from open bays with a few side room to only single rooms. It is a mixed cardiac and med/surg ICU with a smaller transitional care unit attached. Continue reading “BC Children’s Hospital Vancouver”→

Montreal Children’s Hospital is a beautiful brand new hospital which only got moved into last year. It is bright and colourful and the PICU is a very light and airy feeling unit with large single rooms. Continue reading “Montreal Children’s Hospital”→

In both Toronto SickKids and Montreal Children’s Hospital, I was struck by the inclusion of the bioethical team into PICU practice, not only to support difficult decision but as part of the psychosocial team to look at how better to support families, and also to support the nursing and medical team to talk through issues or cases on the PICU that might be causing moral distress.